Darkthaw (26 page)

It's only a shadow in the dark night—its coat so black.

Blue.

And I notice there's someone lying inside the cage.

Isi.

I am back on the Watch flats with Matisa. She is whole: her glossy black hair hangs in a curtain around her face, and her skin is smooth.

Her movement is fluid as she bends and scoops up a handful of soil and plant.

It's the plant that protects against the Bleed, I know. But I can't remember the name . . . I lean forward, reaching for
it, but she plucks it up with her other hand and crushes it into dust with one strong fist. She holds the soil out to me, a mound of black on her pink palm.

The dead in the river sing out, and I turn my head to look at the shining waters.

And now Matisa is at my feet, but her skin is mottled and bruised, swollen with blood.

I fall beside her and dig, pulling up handfuls of soil and pressing them to her, covering her in the earth. Burying her.

A rush of hoofbeats comes. Gunfire. Horses. Screaming.

The voices of the dead call out.

Make peace with it
.

The voices drift over me like currents. They ebb and flow, seeping into my mind, filling the night air around me.

“—said there'd be a half-dozen reds.”

“Damn liar. You see that cripple? She had no idea—”

“—either that or as stupid as a mule.”

“—not just gonna sit here and—”

“But if she's what he says—”

My head snaps up. Moonlight streams down from high above, washing my hands and the rough bark before me in green light.

For a moment I can't figure where I am, but as I twist and feel the leather bindings dig into my wrists, feel my arms ache with the force of being held shoulder-height too long, it floods back. The men. Taking me. Putting each arm around either side of this tree and tying me here. To my left is Charlie, bound the same way. To my right, the little boys. They've
been allowed to sit—their shackles are on a length of rope that gives them leave to move around the trunk. I shake my fuzzy head. Have I been asleep?

“—take our chances. What else can we—”

“Take them back to the Keep.”

My thoughts sharpen. The Keep. These are Leon's men. I take a couple of deep breaths and crane my head to look over my shoulder.

Toward the riverbank the two men stand, heads together. Gesturing at us. Arguing.

A fire crackles before the wagon, lighting the dark shapes of Isi and Kane inside. Kane lies motionless. I squint hard and hope I'm not imagining that rise and fall of his chest. Matisa is in the same place, still in a heap on the ground. She coughs, rolls to the side, and throws up.

I fight the panic that builds and try to uncloud my thoughts.

I know better than to ask a question, but I need to figure what's going on.

The men wander around, chewing something and spitting it out now and again, checking the horses, checking their weapons.

Checking the hills to the north.

They're watching for something.

Where's the rest?

If they aren't talking about Andre and Violet, could they mean Rebecca? No. They were surprised we were “pales and half bloods.” They're looking for a “half-dozen reds”—Matisa's people.

Julian stops dead, peering into the forest behind us. He
hisses, gesturing for the smaller man to come near. “You hear something?” he asks, pointing into the trees.

The man tilts his head, listening, for a long while. He shrugs and shakes his head no.

They resume their walk about the camp.

When they bend their heads together to talk again, there's a hiss at my left shoulder. Charlie's trying to get me to look at him.

I turn my head and wince. His bright blue eyes, the ones that remind me too much of his pa's, are shot through with crimson spiderwebs, and there's a purple bruise on one cheek. He looks awful—thin, like when we found him. Weak. He takes a deep breath and coughs. It sounds wet, like the people who'd come to Soeur Manon with that “water on their chest” sickness.

“Why—why are you here?” he rasps.

I frown. “Came—” I stop abrupt as the split at the corner of my mouth cracks with a stinging pain. I drop my chin to my shoulder, close my eyes, and press the cut into the sleeve of my shirt. Can't let the men know we're talking, but I need to get a handle on what's going on.

“Where's Rebecca?” I breathe.

“They sent her to that Keep,” he mutters.

Charlie is the men's prisoner, too. So did he try to trade Matisa to them and get taken himself? Or was he truly trying to get away that day?

That small flicker of hope that Charlie didn't betray us tugs at my heart again. Mayhap it's not what Isi thought.

Course, that does us no good right now.

“You speak English.” For a minute I think the words
are directed at me. I crane my neck. It's the blond man—Julian—speaking through the bars of the cage at Isi. Isi sits motionless, his face blank. “You want to be stupid about this, we can find ways to make you smart.” He stalks to the back of the wagon, reaches down, and grabs Matisa by the arm. She ragdolls in his grasp. Isi leaps to the back of the cage.

Julian grins at him. “Find your tongue?” And now I see why he's so familiar. That blond man at the Keep—Leon—Julian looks so like him, they could be kin.

I watch him tug at Matisa. Her bloodless face, her limp body. Throwing up like that—might be what Soeur Manon called
la maladie de la chaleur
: heat sickness. Sometimes the gatherers in the gardens would get it if they hadn't covered their heads proper on a real hot day.

How long has she been tied behind that cart?

“Yes, you found it,” the man continues. “We just need to get it workin'—”

“He's not one of them!” Charlie calls out in a wheeze.

Julian stops and straightens. He cocks his head like he's considering something, drops Matisa, and starts toward us. The way he moves spikes cold through my chest. He gets close and bends his head to Charlie. “Then where are they?”

Charlie swallows. “They're—they're coming—”

Julian places a hand on Charlie's back and shoves him into the tree. He leans his weight on his hand.

Charlie lets out a horrifying, strangled scream. I pull my head to the side, press it into my arm so I don't have to see.

“You better be telling the truth,” he says. “If this was a lie to make yourself more valuable than that sister of yours, you're going to regret it.”

Charlie's scream turns into a half sob, half choke. There's something inside his chest that's broken, I know it by the sound. I swallow the bile that rises in my throat.

“They're coming!” Charlie gasps.

“They'd better be,” Julian says. He turns his sharp eyes on me. “You want the other side of that loose mouth split, you keep talking.” My insides twist. He knew Charlie and I were conversing. But he steps back and turns away, speaking loud for the other man to hear. “They don't show by noon, we're moving on. Ceril will be happy with those two in the cage.”

Ceril. The man I attacked. My blood thrums in my ears. Julian nods at me. “And I know someone who's looking for females.” The blood rushes louder, putting a sickness in my gut. He runs a hand through his hair and smiles that dead smile. “You”—he looks at Charlie—“can stay here and rot.”

THE MOON HAS LONG DISAPPEARED, AND THE
black of night is softening into an eerie blue. Trails of mist come off the river, creeping over the bank like ghost fingers. Dawn comes.

The men have dozed, taking turns patrolling the hills to the north, the forest to the south. In the blue light, they sit around their fire, drinking something out of metal cups.

My tongue is stuck to the roof of my mouth, and my arms are numb. I'm so thirsty. My skin is prickling all over me in an itchy heat. I'm losing touch with what's real, I know it. Twice these past hours I felt the forest move and breathe at my back, like the trees had come alive and wanted to reach out, carry me—us—to safety. Like that presence from my dreams—the one that was waiting for me in the grove—is there. Coming for me.

It's plain addled.

Kane and Isi are in that cage, the boys and I are tied here,
and the men have got those bleedin' weapons at the ready. I force myself to look at Matisa, lying in that pitiful heap behind the wagon. She had reprieve from the heat for the night, but that sun'll come up, and it'll come up fierce. No way she'll last too much longer like that. For hours I've been trying to figure what to do, but all it's done is distracted me from worrying about Kane.

He still hasn't moved. And Isi's acting so strange. Hasn't gone to him once. Doesn't look at us.

My heart sinks. Does he blame me for this?

As the light grows, the smaller man stands and takes something from the back of the wagon. It's a long satchel of some kind—about the size of his gun.

“Goddamn it, Emmett, not that thing again,” Julian says. He turns his head to the side and spits into the dust. He cocks his head at the trees. “You hear something?” he asks.

The little man—Emmett—shrugs.

Julian grabs his gun. “I'm going to look around.”

“I'll keep an eye on them.” Emmett fumbles with a catch on the satchel.

“If something happens, fire a shot,” Julian says. He spits again. “Try not to hit one of them.” He laughs and stalks off into the woods, leaving Emmett at the fire.

I look around. The little boys are asleep, tangled together; a mess of limbs and chain. A low melody starts up, thin and scratchy but nice—and all out of place with this filth. My head snaps toward the sound.

Emmett has a fiddle, but he's not playing it like the men from my settlement. Instead of resting it on the crook of his arm, he's got it tucked under his chin. He stares into the fire
as he plays. Never seen anyone play like that. Never heard a sound like that, neither. Can't reconcile something so beautiful made by someone so . . .

My mouth throbs. I close my eyes, try to pretend for a heartbeat we're somewhere else, somewhere good. My thoughts go to the Harvest dance. I think about dancing with Tom, with his wheat hair mussing into his eyes and his pa's too-big shirt. My troubles seemed so big back then, but I'd give anything to be back there right now. Safe inside those walls. Staring at Kane from across the hall, hoping he'd ask me to dance—

“Em.” It's a whisper. Charlie again.

I keep my eyes closed.

“Em.”
More insistent.

I turn my head toward him, real slow.

“Why are you here?” he whispers.

I risk a glance at the fire. Emmett's eyes are closed now, and it's clear he's lost in the sounds he's making. He's paying us no mind. Still, I keep my voice low. Emmett may not be able to hear us, but if Julian is anywhere nearby . . .

“What do you mean?” I whisper.

“Why did you come here? To this forest?”

I frown. “I dreamt it.”

His eyes narrow, like he can't figure my words. They widen. “She knew you'd come.” His face contorts, like he's going to cry.

“Who?”

He shakes his head. “She lied to me,” he says.

“
Who?
”

“Matisa.”

The fiddle stops abrupt. I glance back, heart in my throat, expecting Emmett to be striding toward us. He's bent over the fiddle, fussing with the strings. He pulls and plucks at them before putting it back under his chin to start again.

“We're in trouble now,” Charlie whispers. “Such trouble.”

“What are you speaking on?”

He rests his forehead on his arms. “She told me to bring her here. Said they'd be here.” He looks at the forest floor, like he's talking to himself. “But it's because she knew
you'd
come. They're not coming.”

“Who's ‘they'?”

“Looked like her: black hair and eyes, weapons I've never seen, riding those beasts like the wind. Spoke English rough. Came through my camp not more than a week before you showed up. They told me if I found her and brought her to them I'd be safe.”

A week before. Looking for Matisa. What tale is he spinning?

“I don't understand,” I say. “Why—why did you leave us? At that homestead?”

“I did the only thing that made sense.” Charlie turns his head to look at me. “She was my guarantee of safety.”

So he did take her. Shock and anger flare in me. “We helped you!”

“Helped us?” Charlie laughs low. It's an ugly sound. “You planned to cut us loose soon as you could. You would've sacrificed us to save your own hides in a heartbeat.”

“That's not true.”

“Ain't it? You saw how they hemmed and hawed over your
friend's
trapped leg. Imagine if that had been me? And if I hadn't offered up my bow, you'd still be there while it withered and rotted off.”